[Bards] college versus community

[Jay Rudin]

Michael Silverhands responded to Alden Drake:

> I think it's more like talking about a fraternity. I'm hearing the
> theory that we might feel like a more close-knit community if we
> could say "Hail, sister, and well-met" when we met another member of
> the college. But that's where I get hung up: we can do that today,
> when we meet another *bard*. (You are one if you say you're one.) You
> don't need a college to achieve that. You don't even need "gang
> colors" (a blue favor or whatever), although it arguably makes it
> easier to pick one of us out of a crowd.

I'm a child of the sixties.  When I went to college in 1973 ... (Yes, yes, I 
know.  But the early seventies is when we really held the sixties.  Work 
with me here.)  When I went to college in 1973, it was popular for college 
students to say that marriage was unnecessary -- "I don't need a piece of 
paper to tell me I'm in love."  It was idealistic, noble, ... and flat 
wrong.

Marriage really does matter.  Commitment really does matter.  So does 
officially and formally banding together as a college.

Yes, we can say "Hail, sister, and well-met" without a college, and in fact, 
nobody has suggested that we need one for that.  I suggested that we would 
have greater collegiality if we officially banded together, met regularly in 
fellowship and mutual support, and did things together as a group.

"But we can do that without a college."  Yes, yes, yes.  We can.

But we don't.

Real, actual problems have been brought up, and a college has been suggested 
as a tool to fix them.  You are arguing that even without a college these 
problems would be fixed.  The problem with that argument is that it is 
clearly untrue.  Without the college, right now, they are *not* fixed.

If you wish to give argument that the college won't help, go ahead.  I'll be 
happy to read such an argument.  But your suggestion above that we would 
have these things even without a college is simply untrue.  Look around you; 
we don't have them.

The course of the discussion was:
Gerald brings up problems.
Others agree that these problems exist.
Some people suggest that a college would help.

If you think a college won't help build the collegiality we lack, feel free 
to say so, and to give reasons.  But don't argue the the problem we really 
have today would be fixed without a change is nonsense.

Robin of Gilwell / Jay Rudin